DAY THREE: Anne finding her own path of glory in the simulated WWI trench behind the Indiana Military Museum in Vincennes.
Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: we guided you through six non-consecutive days of travel from July 3rd through the 11th around various locales within our home state of Indiana, the best we could do with out-of-state travel forbidden to me for work-related reasons during the Age of Coronavirus. It all comes down to this, per our tradition for every MCC road trip story: one final collection of alternate scenes, extra details, and surplus attractions along the way that were squeezed out of the main narrative. Enjoy!
DAY ONE: While searching for the gravesite of Ben-Hur creator Lew Wallace in Crawfordsville, this stranger’s tombstone caught our eye.
Side view of the Montgomery County Courthouse, also in Crawfordsville. Sometimes we brake for ye olde courthouses and their architecture, but our schedule was limited.
DAY TWO: At the Virgil I. “Gus” Grissom Museum in Mitchell, a selection of IDs and other props from his aerospace career.
Grissom’s Distinguished Flying Cross, bestowed in 1952 for his Korean War service.
Grissom’s uniform hat, marred by my reflection.
DAY THREE: A more accusatory take on the Francis Vigo statue outside the George Rogers Clark Memorial.
Alternate take of the George Rogers Clark statue inside the memorial, previously Instagrammed.
War ribbon collection at the Indiana Military Museum.
A torpedo from the USS Grayback, a.k.a. “The Gray Ghost”, lost in February 1944 somewhere between Luzon and Formosa.
Souvenirs from wars besides WWII included this assortment of German WWI paraphernalia.
A bust of U.S. Army General Alexander Haig. He served in Korea and Vietnam before serving in two different White House Cabinet positions under three different Presidents. The later years of his careers were…um, kind of a roller coaster.
Uniform of USMC General Peter Pace, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs for two years under George W. Bush.
DAY FOUR: A Cessna T-37B on display at the Grissom Air Museum in Peru.
Also flying at the Grissom Air Museum: this happy bird.
Later in Kokomo: the last remaining angle on the amazing colossal KokoMantis.
Side two of “When the Earth Moves”, the sculpture in front of Kokomo City Hall. No idea what’s being built across the street.
Kokomo’s alley full of art-about-artists by Muckrock included a few faces I’m ashamed not to recognize. Is this…it’s not Erykah Badu, right? Please help an unhip old guy out?
Two more profiles stumping me. That isn’t Marvin Gaye, perchance?
DAY FIVE: Surplus chickens from Traders Point Creamery in Zionsville.
DAY SIX: the centerpiece of our very own downtown Indianapolis, the Soldiers and Sailors Monument. We’ve posted pics of it before, but it’s a reminder that while leaving the house could get us killed, let alone the state, Indiana still has sights to see in our own backyard.
…and that’s the vacation that was, the best we could do under massively mismanaged pandemic conditions. The final statistics:
- 5 museums
- 4 parks
- 3 Gus Grissom attractions
- 3 Rosie the Riveters
- 3 encounters with roses
- 3 batches of coneflowers
- 2 donut shops
- 2 flocks of birds
- 2 loner birds
- 2 roaming turtle gangs
- 2 nods to a USS Indianapolis
- 1 comic shop
- 1 comic strip character
- 1 comic
- countless COVID-related signs
- 1 business without masked employees
- 0 COVID-19 diagnoses between the two of us
The End. Thanks for reading. Lord willing, our next vacation will be even better. At the very least, it’d be nice to be allowed over state lines again someday.
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[Link enclosed here to handy checklist for other chapters and for our complete road trip history to date. Follow us on Facebook or via email sign-up for new-entry alerts, or over on Twitter if you want to track my faint signs of life between entries. Thanks for reading!]
Midlife Crisis Crossover! 